Moonlight Owls player and league co-founder Napheesa Collier said Friday that Unrivaled's opening night was "everything we hoped it would be."
In the opener, Collier's Lunar Owls defeated Brianna Stewart's Mists, mounting a comeback in the fourth quarter with two 3-pointers from Skylar Diggins-Smith sealing the win. Arike Ogunbowale's Vinyl then defeated Angel Reese's Rose to win the second game.
What does the new 3-on-3 women’s professional basketball league bring us?
After the Laces defeated Phantom on Saturday to advance to the second day's opener, the Lunar Owls are back in action against the Rose. Diggins-Smith hit her second game-winning shot in as many days - this time a game-winning free throw - in the second half to score all nine of her points. Collier scored a game-high 31 points.
Kayla McBride scored a team-high 28 points on 7-of-15 shooting from beyond the arc.
Here are the results from Saturday's game.
Diggins-Smith once again sealed the win for the Lunar Owls on Saturday afternoon, providing the league's first game-winning shot from the free throw line. So far, Unrivaled's penalty rule appears to be well-received for speeding up the game. They also amplify every success and failure. That meant Rose's four turnovers -- including three after halftime -- really put them in trouble in a game that ended with a tie in the third quarter and ultimately a nine-point loss. Three of the four games this weekend were decided by single digits, so free throw shooting could indeed impact some outcomes throughout the season.
But Collier's mesmerizing performance - 58 points in less than 24 hours, all on the court - also helped the Lunar Owls improve to 2-0. She's the first player in Unrivaled history to score 25 points in multiple games and only the third to score at least 30 points in a game -- all while doing so with her signature calmness and steadiness. The burden of co-founding this alliance. What a great weekend on and off the field for Collier, who put in a stellar performance while delivering a successful first weekend in this new league.
One thing I'll look at next: Through four games, it's clear that the one-hour television window for each game is too short. On Saturday, the finals ended closer to 4:30 p.m. ET instead of the originally scheduled 4 p.m. Will TNT need to handle longer games, or will Unrivaled tweak any rules to speed things up even more? Now that we've seen how it works, it'll be interesting to see if anything else about the game format will be adjusted (mid-season or potentially into year two). -- Alexa Philip
The opener was a perfect example of what Unrivaled officials said the league expected to win, and then the energy dropped noticeably as soon as the second day of play began.
Maybe it's because the first game of the day ends at 2 PM ET. But the game between the Lace and Phantoms was an old-fashioned blowout. The Phantoms struggled to make anything happen on both ends of the field in a crowded field. No tension. No drama. There is no suspense.
If these games weren't close and weren't a tiebreaker battle, Unrivaled's matches would lose a lot of their appeal. There were long moments of silence in the building - hypebeasts walking around trying to make waves in the audience. Others turned to players from other teams in the stands, hoping to take a photo.
When the fourth quarter arrived, the Laces had the game in the bag. It's just a matter of how quickly they can reach the winning score. -- Kendra Andrews
The Phantoms have certainly struggled, but now that we've seen all six of the Unbeatables take the field, are the Lace the early favorites to be the best team in the league? There's a lot to like about this team: They can shoot (13 3-pointers on Saturday), move the ball very well, and already have great chemistry. We saw a fair amount of isolation play on Friday, with no team having more than 14 assists in a game, and the Laces finishing with 23 assists - a testament to their shooting prowess, and a testament to the ball's Play with the team's offensive flow and player input.
McBride was the star player with 28 points and seven 3-pointers, but every Laces player on the court scored in double figures -- something no other team had accomplished through the first three games.
There were concerns about the Laces' lack of rim protection, but that didn't affect them on Saturday: The Phantoms scored just 48 points on 33 percent shooting, and the Laces limited Satou Sabally and Brittney Griner to 16 combined points. point.
More promisingly, this team will be even better once two-way star Jackie Young returns from injury. An interesting tidbit: The format is noticeably different, but it’s worth noting that half of the Lace—Tiffany Hayes, Stephanie Dolson, and Yang—are 3x3 Olympians, and Dolson and Yang were together in Tokyo Won the gold medal. -- Philip